3 Communication Pitfalls To Avoid

Today I am recovering from a 5-day mini vacation / destination wedding in the heart of the U.S. in Nashville, TN. I may have over-celebrated a little bit. 🙂 Being that it is Tuesday after Memorial Day Weekend, I’m betting many of you are also recovering from hopefully fun-filled weekends. So I thought a short, but informative blog post was in order.

One thing you’ll hear over and over again, both in polyamorous and in traditional relationships, is that communication is the single most important part of building a happy, healthy relationship. I find this to be very true. Often, the difference between a healthy and an unhealthy relationship simply comes down to the quality of the communication between the two individuals.

There are many ways to make your relationships go off the rails because of communication issues. The simplest ones — lie to your partner, withhold information from your partner, refuse to talk about an issue with your partner — are all great ways to sabotage a relationship. I always like to say and believe: “The truth will set you free.” And “When in doubt, just be honest and up front” — all while you talk and hug it out. Empathy is a wonderful thing.

I often struggle with trying to find out where the line is between transparency and privacy as far as “openness” goes, especially of course in an open, poly relationship. But negotiating that boundary also comes down to how well you can compassionately and effectively communicate your needs to your partner, and they to you. I once heard from a very wise person (who happened to be playing a concert at the Opera House in Sydney, Australia!) that… “Our success in life partly comes from the number of uncomfortable conversations we are willing to have.” How many uncomfortable, awkward or difficult conversations are you willing to have in order to maintain healthy, honest relationships?

As far as what NOT to do, here is a very short but great reminder list: